


The Out Of This World Disappearance Of Marlena Glenn

by MadameGemKnight



Category: Buzzfeed Unsolved (Web Series), He-Man and the Masters of the Universe
Genre: Alternate History, Explosions, Fire, Gen, Meta Humor, My First Fanfic, Not Really Character Death, Outer Space, POV Outsider, Screenplay/Script Format, Swearing, but I use [expletive] for any swearing because I am a baby, if you need anything tagged please don't hesitate to ask!, use of the MOTU series bible
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-28
Updated: 2020-12-28
Packaged: 2021-03-10 21:33:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,267
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28363959
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MadameGemKnight/pseuds/MadameGemKnight
Summary: An astronaut breaking boundaries vanishes into thin air, taking her crew with her. Was it a tragic accident, or was something more sinister involved?
Relationships: No Romantic Relationship(s), Shane and Ryan are REAL PEOPLE why would I do that to them
Comments: 2
Kudos: 6





	The Out Of This World Disappearance Of Marlena Glenn

**Author's Note:**

> A quick guide to understanding the fic:  
> Normal text is meant to be dialogue when Shane and Ryan are on-screen.  
>  _Italics_ are for voiceover.  
>  **Bolded text** is for the blue and yellow text on a black screen.  
> Any meta jokes/links to sources used will be in the notes after the fic.  
> Please enjoy!

[VOICEOVER] RYAN: _This week on Buzzfeed Unsolved, we examine the out of this world disappearance of Marlena Glenn and the crew of the Rainbow Explorer, often listed as one of the most mysterious vanishings in U.S. history._

SHANE: Oh I think I’ve heard of this lady. She was, uh - she was the space lady, right? The first woman to go to space?  
RYAN: Well, technically that honor goes to Valentina Tereshkova, but yes, she was the first American woman to go to space.  
S: Good for her! At least she got to be first at something. Who was the second American woman?  
R:Uh, Sally Ride, I think. She was mentioned in a few of the articles I read.  
S:Man, must have sucked to be her. Imagine having a cool-[expletive] name like Sally Ride and then getting beaten to the punch by someone named _Marlena._  
R: [Exasperated sigh] Let’s get into it.

* * *

_[V.O] R: Marlena Glenn was born on April 24, 1960 at the Houston Methodist Hospital in Texas to parents Lou and Jay Glenn. Her childhood was reportedly a very happy one, and her parents were extremely accepting of her, at the time, rather bizarre interests. According to an interview with Time Magazine in 1987, Marlena claimed that quote,_ “They were always on board with my dreams. When I first expressed interest in NASA and space travel, they took me to our local library and let me check out every book on the topic...I wouldn’t be where I am without them,” _end quote._

**oh that’s sweet**

  
**yeah that’s really nice**

  
**I was worried, uh, when you started talking about her parents that they would be -**

  
**that they would be jerks?**

**that they - yeah, that they were going to be like some of the other families we’ve had on this show**

  
**like cartoonishly evil**

  
**hahaha yeah**  
**“daddy I want to go to space when I grow up!” “oh, i’ll send you to space, sweetie!” and then he like, punts her like a football -**

  
**(wheeze)**

  
**like a villainous charlie brown or something**

  
**hahaha**

S: [miming running] “I’m gonna send that daughter of mine straight to the moon!”  
R: [laughing] And then she just sidesteps him and he’s all “WAUGH!”  
S: [cartoonish screaming]

[V.O] R: _The support of her parents would help Glenn achieve what was, at the time, thought to be impossible - a job at NASA as an actual astronaut. Graduating from the University of Texas with a Master degree in engineering, she not only had the education necessary to become an astronaut, but the flight experience as well, her parents helping her enroll in various flight and piloting programs as early as 16._

R: She was learning to fly planes when she was 16! What were you doing when you were 16, besides being the tallest manchild at your school?  
S: Haha, very funny Beef Boy. But I was going to say, this lady sounds amazing! Like, to accomplish all this in, what, the 80s, the 70s?  
R: She graduated in ‘84, ‘85, so yeah. Pretty amazing.  
S: And now I’m all sad, ‘cause I know that this is going to end with her dying or being blown up or something.  
R: Oh, you’ll see.  
S: Will I?  
R: I mean, kinda, but the word “unsolved” is in the title for a reason, so -  
S: So be prepared for heartbreak is what you’re saying.

[V.O] R: _Despite her impressive resume, Glenn had to fight tooth and nail to get accepted into NASA as an astronaut, and would not be part of an active mission until 1987, two years after she joined. She was finally accepted onto the June 26th virgin flight of the Rainbow Explorer, a shuttle she would later go on to pilot. The crew consisted of her and three other astronauts, including pilot Martin Hillsdale. Five hours into launch, however, a lithium perchlorate canister, which was used to generate oxygen, began to leak, starting a fire that severely burned Trevor on his arms and upper torso. Springing into action, Glenn not only put out the fire, but took over as pilot, managing to safely complete the mission and return home to Earth while her copilots tended to Hillsdale’s wounds, managing to keep him alive long enough to receive proper medical attention and fully recover._

**holy [expletive]!**

  
**yeah she was pretty amazing**

  
**and this was all on her first flight?**

  
**all on her first flight, yeah**

  
**I did not think it was possible to love this lady more than I already did, but [expletive], she’s out here pulling a james bond -**

  
**(wheeze) a james bond?**

  
**or some other action hero! Being all cool and casual in the face of danger! everyone is panicking, this martin guy has half his arm burnt off, and she’s all -**

S: [mimes putting on sunglasses] Don’t worry. I’ve got this.  
R: [laughs] _Goldfinger_ starts playing over the shuttle’s speakers -  
S: She grabs a bottle of bourbon -  
R: [wheeze]

[V.O.] R: _After returning home from the mission, Glenn was quickly hailed as a hero by the American public, with an article in the New York Times claiming that, quote, “_ never since the days of Sally Pitcher and Clara Barton has America had such a resourceful woman to look up to,” _end quote. She went on multiple talk shows, frequently talking about the discrimination she had faced and advocating for equality regardless of race, gender, or sexuality, and was named TIME’s Person of The Year for 1987. Her heroism was honored by NASA, as well, who accepted her onto several more missions throughout the late 80s, and in 1990 offered her a once-in-a-lifetime role of pilot for the first manned trip to Europa, one of Jupiter’s moons. Glenn, of course, said yes._

S: Man, I love this lady!  
R: Yeah, she was by all accounts a really wonderful lady to be around, very accepting for the time period.  
S: I was just going to say that. Overall, she seems very bad-[expletive], but now I’m getting worried because this mission is probably going to be the death of her.  
R: [looks at the camera; grins]  
S: Stop that.

[V.O.] R: _On September 5th, 1990, Glenn and three others - Evelyn Powers, Biff Beastman, and Dr. T.E. Scope -_

**(wheeze)**

  
**(wheeze)**

  
**tell me those aren’t their actual names**

  
**those are their actual names!**

  
**you’re [expletive] me! biff BEASTMAN?**

  
**I’m not - it’s on their official records and everything!**

  
**who names their kid BIFF? did his parents hate him or something?**

  
**hahaha**

[V.O.] R: _The four astronauts boarded the Rainbow Explorer, with Glenn serving as captain, Powers (another female astronaut who had joined NASA around the same time Marlena had) and Scope serving as the on-flight scientists, and Beastman serving as Chief Technician. The mission was to not only be the first manned flight to Europa, but also the first manned trip outside of the asteroid belt, and the Explorer was prepared with several defensive and offensive devices. However, despite this, only five days into the mission, the Warrior drastically veered off course, and NASA received a message from Glenn claiming that the ship was in grave danger. While the full message has never been released to the public, a small clip from the end of the transmission has, which I will now play._

[V.O.] MARLENA GLENN: _Can anyone hear me? This is Lieutenant Marlena Glenn of the Earth [static] Rainbow Explorer. I’ve been caught in [static] and [static] off course. Does anyone [static]..._

  
[V.O.] R: _Only minutes after receiving the transmission, NASA lost all contact with not only Glenn, but the entire ship, which disappeared off their radar in a matter of seconds. Even after repeated attempts at contact and a search and rescue shuttle being sent a week later to the last known location, nothing was found. After a month of searching, on October 21st, the crew of the Rainbow Explorer were declared legally dead in a, quote,_ “asteroid-related accident,” _end quote. With the circumstances of their bizarre disappearance out of the way, let’s get into some theories._

* * *

THEORY ONE

  
_Our first theory is that the Rainbow Explorer was, as NASA declared, destroyed by asteroids. The asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter contains several asteroids, minor planets, and even dwarf planets, such as Ceres, and several of the bodies in the outer part of the belt show cometary activity. However, the Explorer, as mentioned before, had state-of-the-art defensive and offensive devices designed in the case of an asteroid collision, and NASA itself had proven that it was highly unlikely for an asteroid collision to occur during the flight of the Pioneer 10 Space Probe, launched over 10 years earlier in 1972. In fact, according to Space Daily, the chances of actually running into a comet are, quote,_ “far less than one in a billion,” _end quote._

S: Well, that doesn’t mean that it didn’t happen.  
R: Of course it doesn’t, it just means that it’s very unlikely, especially given how adept Marlena was proven to be in the face of danger.  
S: Her crewman’s arm catching on fire is different from an asteroid hitting the ship, Ryan. She can’t just spray a giant space rock with water and send it floating away.  
R: I’m just saying that if a satellite didn’t hit anything, it would be incredibly unlikely for a piloted ship to!  
S: Okay, yeah, that’s fair.

* * *

THEORY TWO

  
[V.O.] R: _Our second theory is that the Explorer was sabotaged by its own crew - more specifically, by Powers, Scope, and Beastman. While Marlena was overjoyed at her spot on the Explorer, her crewmates were less so. Evelyn Powers very publicly resented Glenn for being both the first American woman in space as well as the pilot for the Explorer mission, going as far as to say, quote,_ “that brat has nothing for her but dumb luck and a cute face. If she had to face a real problem out there, she would never come back,” _end quote._

**we solved the mystery!**

  
**[wheeze]**

  
**alright, NASA, wrap it up, the ghoul boys cracked the case!**

[V.O.] R: _Powers, however, was not the only member on board who despised their spot on the mission - Beastman reportedly claimed before takeoff that if he had known that his role would essentially boil down to that of gofer, he would have stayed home on his farm, and Scope, who had applied numerous times for missions, apparently spent the entire mission complaining to Ground Control about how a mission such as this was, quote,_ “beneath someone of his intelligence,” _end quote._

S: [laughing] So he spends all this time going, [in the voice of Gene who is french fries] “oh please, Mr. NASA! Let me on a shuttle!” and then as soon as he gets on he claims that he’s smarter than all of them?  
R: To be fair, he was reportedly the person who designed all of the optic devices for NASA at the time, but yeah. Pretty jerk move.  
S: WAIT. The guy who designed the optic devices was named _T.E. Scope?_  
R: Yeah, dude!  
S: Their names are even more [expletive] dumb than I realized! Those could not have been their real names, Ryan!  
R: [laughing] They were! It was on their memorial and everything!  
S: Oh my gosh, imagine if it was a nickname and nobody realized, and now these poor saps have these wack cartoon villain names on their memorial.  
R: [coughing and laughing at the same time]

[V.O.] R: _With tensions high on the Rainbow Explorer, many have theorized that Powers, Scope, and Beastman might have joined together to take revenge on Marlena, who they might have seen as the source of their woes. Those who subscribe to this theory believe that the mysterious calamity that forced Glenn off of course was a coordinated attack by the other astronauts, which would explain the static and low quality in her message. Not only that, but with their pilot out of the picture, the ship could have easily crashed into an asteroid or other natural satellite. While this theory doesn’t explain the lack of debris found, it does explain why there were no other S.O.S. messages from the other astronauts on the Explorer._

S: Yeah, those guys definitely had something to do with the disappearance. Maybe their plan was sabotaged by the asteroids or something, but I do not trust them at all.  
R: They seemed pretty shady from what I read. That Martin guy who was originally the pilot of the Explorer was friends with Marlena, and he spoke out about how Evelyn Powers was pretty blatant about her dislike for them both.

* * *

THEORY THREE

  
[V.O.] R: _Our third theory is that the Explorer was destroyed or kidnapped by aliens -_

**I knew it**

  
**it’s a legitimate theory! and trust me, it’s way more likely than the next one we’re looking at**

  
**I put too much faith in you, Ryan. two good theories in a row and I let my guard down**

**what, did they crash into the millennium falcon and get high with chewbacca?**

**i’m serious! you think this one is weird, it’s downright logical compared to the next one -**

  
**let’s just start the crazy now, buddy**

[V.O.] R: _This theory posits that the reason that there was no debris found was because the Explorer was either kidnapped by a larger ship or disintegrated completely by alien technology, and that whatever Glenn claimed to have been caught in was a tractor beam of some sort. Those who subscribe to this theory also claim that it explains why there were no other S.O.S. messages from the rest of the crew, having been stunned or otherwise incapacitated in some way. The theory also explains why the ship completely vanished from NASA’s radar; perhaps whatever alien species found the crew had advanced cloaking devices or the ability to warp through holes in space and time._

**so what you’re saying is that they crashed into the enterprise and got high with spock instead**

  
**?you’re not going to let that go, are you**

  
**nope! it’s a dumb theory!**

**well this happens to be my favorite, so there**

  
**why, because you like the idea of beastie boy partying with some little green men?**

R: No! It’s because - well, now it just sounds dumb, but I like the thought of Marlena meeting alien life. From all the sources I found, she was just in love with space, the idea of maybe leading a mission to Mars if the Europa trip went as planned, and she was so excited about the possibility of there being other sentient beings out there that she could maybe meet. And, well, this theory is the only way she could achieve any of those dreams.

  
[beat]

  
S: I didn’t think of it that way.  
R: It’s okay, man. It’s probably just me overreacting to something that happened 30 years ago.  
S: No, I get it. I can’t believe I’m saying this, but kinda hope that the Explorer did meet some aliens.  
R: [hopefully] So are you saying that you believe that the Explorer was abducted?  
S: Never in a million years will I say that...but I sure do hope.  
R: Thanks.

* * *

THEORY FOUR

  
[V.O.] R: _Our final theory, and probably the most unbelievable of them all, is that Marlena herself was responsible for the disappearance, and was actually a Soviet spy sent to sabotage the Europa mission._

S: WHAT?  
R: [laughs]  
S: Okay, now I see what you were talking about when you said that aliens were more likely, because ho-ly [expletive]! Someone had to look at this and think, “you know what, the lady born in TEXAS was probably a RUSSIAN SPY. Yes, THAT’S the most logical explanation!” Never in a million years did I think that aliens would be one of the more logical conclusions on this show!  
R: [wheeze] It is a pretty dumb theory.  
S: Please, give me the argument so I can rip it apart.

[V.O.] R: _This theory posits that Marlena Glenn was actually born Marlena Annatrova, with her family moving to America when she was a child and serving as spies for the Soviet Union. Glenn, according to this theory, was chosen as a cover name due to the similarly-named John Glenn, the first American to orbit the Earth. Marlena was then trained in order to infiltrate NASA and sabotage their space program in some way, with the Explorer flight being chosen in the end. However, this theory has several holes._

S: Yeah, no [expletive]!  
R: [laughing] You uh - you wanna list some, bud?  
S: Okay, this is off the top of my head, but one, this entire plan hinges not only on Marlena being accepted into NASA, which she almost wasn’t -  
R: She almost wasn’t, correct -  
S: - but also on her getting accepted onto an important mission! Second, we have her birth records and everything, don’t we?  
R: Well, people who believe this theory claim that they were forged -  
S: Oh, yeah, like Stalin’s going to know what an American birth certificate looks like. [in a bad Russian accent] Ah yes, is traditional Texan birth certificate! Must not get mixed up with Canadian birth certificate, though! Would be bad time for all!  
R: I don’t think Stalin - or Lenin, whoever was in charge back then - would have, like, personally forged them.  
S: And finally, she was born when, 1963? Around that time?  
R: Uh, she was born in [checks papers] 1960.  
S: WELL WHEN THE HECK DID JOHN GLENN GO TO SPACE?

[Cut to the two huddled around Ryan’s phone]

R: Siri, when did John Glenn go to space?  
SIRI: Here’s an answer from Wikipedia. On February 20, 1962, Glenn flew the Friendship 7 mission, becoming the first American to orbit the Earth, and the fifth person and third American in space.  
S: [Gestures triumphantly] Two years later!  
R: [laughing] I never said I believed the theory, man! I think it’s dumb as [expletive], too! [aside] Thank you, Siri.  
SIRI: You’re welcome.  
R: But yeah, that theory was pretty much made by a bunch of conspiracy theorists - ‘cause remember, the Cold War wouldn't be over until 1991.  
S: Still dumb!

* * *

[V.O.] R: _On a fall night in 1990, the Rainbow Explorer vanished into space, taking a bold crew with it. Marlena Glenn, Evelyn Powers, T.E. Scope, and Biff Beastman were mourned by the world at large, with a statue erected in their honor on the 20th anniversary of their disastrous flight. While many at NASA are still searching for the missing crew, Glenn’s parents gained acceptance early on, claiming in an interview four years later that now, at least, their daughter was forever among the stars. And indeed, whether it was an accident, an act of sabotage, or an alien encounter, the only other guarantee of this case is that it remains...unsolved._

S: What’s really unsolved here is why NASA decided to hire three people with the names of 80s cartoon villains.  
R: [laughing] Yeah, it’s like, “oh, sorry, Ms. Glenn, we’re not sure we want you on board,” and then they turn around and go, “ah, Stabby McMurderface, my -”  
S: [wheeze] “Stabby McMurderface, our most trustworthy pilot! Can you follow me into this dark room where we store the uh, the death robots for a second?”  
R: “I’LL BATHE THE WALLS WITH YOUR BLOOD.”  
S: “Aw, that’s the Stabby I know and love!”

WHAT UNSOLVED MYSTERY DO YOU WANT TO SEE NEXT?

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading all the way through!  
> Some notes on the more meta jokes made throughout, for those unfamiliar with Masters of The Universe:  
> * Marlena's parents are named after Lou and Jay Scheimer - Lou was one of the founders of Filmation, and Jay, his wife, voiced Marlena in a few episodes. If Marlena's parents actually have a name, I have not found the source for it. Martin Hillsdale is just a guy I made up.  
> * The names Evelyn Powers, Biff Beastman, etc., as well as the Europa mission, are all from the original MOTU series bible! They were never used in-show, so they're not canon per se, but I find them neat and a couple other fics on here have used them.  
> * Theory Four is a reference to the fact that for about a year, the Wiki Grayskull page on Marlena claimed that her backstory was that her family had fled Soviet Russia and settled in Houston, changing their last name from Annatrova to Glenn. It has since been corrected, but I thought it would make a funny theory (and I used Houston as her birthplace, because why not?).  
> * Marlena's last transmission is taken from the episode "The Rainbow Warrior."  
> As for non-MOTU notes of interest, the Houston Methodist Hospital is a real hospital, a lithium perchlorate fire actually occured on the space shuttle Mir in 1997, and the Space Daily source quoted by Ryan is a real article I used as research - you can find it here: https://www.spacedaily.com/reports/New_Horizons_Crosses_The_Asteroid_Belt.html  
> I hope you enjoyed my first fic!


End file.
